


pale sky

by theratitescouch



Category: Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Flirting, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Humor, Inspired by Music, Long-Distance Friendship, M/M, Slow Build, Texting, seriously I laid it on thick with the dumb jokes, text fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-18 17:33:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,363
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29121978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theratitescouch/pseuds/theratitescouch
Summary: (Previously called "FALL! HARD!")Two idiots stumble their way through life.
Relationships: Clay | Dream/GeorgeNotFound (Video Blogging RPF)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 25





	1. penis PTSD and slenderman kinnies

**Author's Note:**

> Nice to see you. Hopefully you're having a good day. If not, then that's okay. Get yourself a tea, maybe curl up with your favorite stuffed animal, and read your heart out. I'll be here. :)
> 
> (Bella I swear to god if you're reading this get out of here)

Dream: real talk

Dream: true crime shows kind of slap

Geez: Depends on what shows you’re watching

Dream: who are you to judge my preferences before I’ve even told you them?

Geez: Not a dumbass?

Dream: it’s Buzzfeed Unsolved

Geez: I’m blocking you

Dream: such a shame that you can’t reach my ego with how small your wingspan is

Geez: WOW

“No texting and driving!” Coach James booms, his boisterous voice taking hold of the entire room.

Dream sighs, pocketing his phone. The ‘texting and driving’ joke was a  _ brilliant  _ little thing Coach came up with last year, when he was talking to Harley about cars while walking on a treadmill. It’s really fascinating, how you can see the cogs in that man’s brain turn.

He has to jam his finger into the old, creaky treadmill screen to get the damn thing to elevate more. Sometimes it goes out of control and sends the runner up on a one-way ticket to God’s damned doorstep, providing a heavy sense of probable doom every time he slams his hands down on the “up” arrow.

Poor Danny. He hasn’t been the same since the Sentient Murder Conveyer Belt Mishap of 2016. Dream is now in his senior year, a whole three years of emotional baggage held as a trophy below his metaphorical belt, and Danny is still plagued with a horrible fear of treadmills.

When Coach loudly reiterates the presence of the five-minute bell, Dream’s class trudges out of the tiny room with sweat clinging to their foreheads and muscles aching.

Back in the locker room, he changes at record time and shoots a text back to George.

Dream: I don’t have a final period, amuse me while I walk aimlessly all the way to the parking lot

He makes it up two flights of stairs, trudging down a long hallway stretching by the auditorium. Still no text back.

Dream: is this about the wingspan comment

Dream: siiiiiiiggggghhhhhhhhh

Dream: you know I didn’t mean that right

Dream: your arms are probably extremely long

Dream: and grand

Dream: your hands probably graze the ground when you walk, they’re so long

Dream: you’re like Slenderman or some shit

Dream: but less scary

Dream: at least I HOPE you have a face

Dream: I also didn’t mean to add salt to the wound by implying you don’t have a face

Dream: I’m sure, if I were correct, that your lack of facial features is appealing

Dream: sun shining over a bald expanse of nothingness

Dream: if you didn’t have a face would you have a nose? Would there still be vague structure?

Dream: just asking because even if you were secretly Slenderman, his face is very one-dimensional and it’s sorta impossible to tell if he genuinely has a damn nose

Dream: except it may not have nostrils

Dream: because they don’t show up

Dream: he is very far away in many of the pictures

Dream: wait is it Slenderman or The Operator

Dream: I just remembered that he used to be called that

Dream: biggie TO

Dream: the great Operator

Dream: Ponyboy Nothingface

Dream: what scares me is the fact that the last one could actually get pulled off in that universe

Dream: really, if you name a kid Sodapop, the limits are nonexistent

Dream: they’re just gone

Dream: way up in the stratosphere

Dream: I’m having a really great time, talking to myself

Dream: what a grand unrequited conversation

Dream: Romeo o Romeo art thou whom I gaze upon in thy mirror

Dream: haha you’d be Juliet

Dream: lame

Dream: girl power tho I guess

Dream: I can’t remember what either of them did

With a tiny, disturbed mutter of,  _ “What the fuck are kids doing these days…”  _ Dream heaves the heavy front doors of his high school open, striding out into the parking lot. The ground is slick and shiny with rainwater, dark clouds hovering ominously over the horizon.

He swings himself into his car, backpack abandoned in the backseat, and the engine starts with a rumbling purr.

***

Dream’s little sister is lounging around on his futon, tapping away at her phone, hair sloping over the cushions. He simply grunts a barely audible greeting to her, kicks his door halfway closed, and flops onto bed.

“Maybe Coach makes you do so much cardio because he’s hurting inside,” she unhelpfully supplies, the energetic music of Subway Surfers suddenly coming over her tinny phone speakers.

“I don’t want to think about that cretin right now,” he groans into the sheets.

With a high-pitched bleep, Dream’s phone vibrates in his hoodie pocket, and he claws it out with anything but elegance.

Geez: I have

Geez: 34 notifications

Geez: And only  _ one  _ of them is from Bad

Dream: what about the other 33

Geez: Ahahaha.

Geez: That wasn’t a happy laugh

Geez: It was straight-up fucking deadpan

Dream: you can deadpan a laugh?

Geez: DREAM

Dream: yeeeaaasss?

Dream: jk

Dream: you gotta admit, some of that rambling was kinda funny

Dream: I huffed a good few laughs on the way to my car

Dream: I would’ve kept going, if not for the threat of rain hanging over the entirety of Florida

Dream: oh guck

Dream: asdfjfj

Geez: What the

Geez: Dream?

Geez: What in the hell is “guck”?

Geez: You were trying to say fuck weren’t you

Geez: Oh my god

Dream: HI GEORGE

Geez: What

Dream: BYE GEORGE

Geez: Bye?

Dream’s sister is cackling in a little ball on the floor. He throws a light paperback book at her and sends the dirtiest scowl he can muster.

Dream: that was my sister

Dream: the fucker attacked me

Dream: but she still gets futon privileges because I’M A GOOD BIG BROTHER

Geez: Maybe if you make it capitalized enough she’ll hear it through how hard you’re stabbing your screen

Dream:  **I’ M A G O O D B IG BR O T H ER**

Geez: Christ, Dream, do it in the notes app

Geez: For fuck’s sake

Dream: I’m going to kill her

Geez: If you do, I hope you know I’m using that text against you in court

Dream: not unless I kill you, too

Geez: You’re really digging your own grave, aren’t you?

Dream: glutton for punishment

Geez: If you use a firearm you’ll get a minimum of 25 years

Dream: nono I’ll use my bare hands

Dream: we’re not going to talk in length about how I would murder my sister

Dream: but I’d definitely choke you

Geez: Kinky, yet sentimental

Geez: I love it

Dream: awwww thank you George

Dream: I’ve been working on my choking skills for a few months now

Dream: you’ll barely feel a thing

Geez: I’ll feel a stab of betrayal

Dream: oh yeah?

Dream: well feel it now really quick, because “stabs of betrayal” aren’t in the itinerary

Geez: What kind of murderer keeps an itinerary

Dream: one that wants a longer prison sentence

Dream: so I can atone for my sins

Geez: Brutal

Dream: Tis the way of life

Dream: the guilt will be crushing for you, George

Geez: I’ll be fucking dead, Dream

Dream: nuh-uh I planned for Sapnap to save you at the last moment

Geez: My hero

Geez: This can easily be read as a bad roleplay attempt between two 12-year-olds

Dream: oh, George

Dream: sweet, innocent George

Geez: Are you going to call me a “sweet summer child” next

Dream: we’re working up to it

Geez: Okay keep going

Dream: I can’t, the moment is lost

Dream: besides, if I keep listing synonyms for “sweet” and “innocent” we’re going to land in a whole different territory

Geez: Damn, I was looking forward to being called your delicious, pure baby boy

Dream: HAHAHAH

Dream: not today, sadly

Dream: another day

Geez: Spicy

Dream: I hope you know I read that in Bill Hader’s voice

Geez: FUCK, it’s hard to get that out of your head

Geez: God, I’m just hearing thousands of iterations of the word “spicy” spoken specifically by Bill Hader

Dream: the man, the myth, the legend, Mr. Hader

Geez: Mr. Hader will see you now

Dream: I draw the line at fifty shades of grey

Dream: it wasn’t even that good

Dream: bad representation

Geez: You really shouldn’t have watched that 40-minute video on the tea of the BDSM community

Dream: it was educational

Dream: I’m surprised they didn’t show it in my 5th grade sex ed class

Geez: You had a sex ed class in 5th grade?

Dream: been haunted with the image of the inner workings of a dick ever since

Dream: sometimes I get flashbacks whenever someone says “anatomy” and “penis” in the same sentence

Geez: So, what, like two times?

Dream: five

Dream: one of them was when Sapnap was talking about being uncomfortable in sex ed class

Geez: Two peas in a pod

Dream: just guys being dudes

Dream: chillin in a hot tub

Dream: roommates

Geez: I don’t think that’s how it goes

Dream: sad

Dream: but yeah no I’ve had to experience vivid penis flashbacks five whole times

Dream: one is expected, but two? Three? Four?

Dream: five?

Dream: do I need to go to a therapist?

Geez: Does it count as trauma?

Dream: it might fall into the PTSD category

Dream: but I don’t know

Dream: what are you doing?

Geez: Watching a dumb crime movie

Geez: Not a documentary, the characters are just doing stupid shit

Geez: They’re leaving their fingerprints everywhere

Dream: is it held in the mid-1800’s?

Geez: 2018

Dream: fuck

Dream: no excuses

Dream: wear gloves, kids

Geez: Amen

Dream: I feel like you’d like horror movies

Geez: I don’t like horror movies

Geez: They give me the heebie jeebies

Dream: yeah, that’s the point?

Geez: I don’t appreciate being scared to sleep, Dream

Dream: maybe when we meet we can watch a horror movie

Dream: start off simple

Dream: with It

Geez: Literally fuck off

Dream: haha

Dream: but that way, if you get scared, I can protect you or something

Dream: be a relaxing presence

Geez: Gay

Geez: You’re anything but relaxing

Dream: am I now?

Dream: care to elaborate, Gee?

Geez: Of fucking course you’d take it that way

Geez: Get whatever kind of smug smirk off your face

A few dragging seconds of nothing pass. Then, finally, George begins typing again. 

Geez: If we watch anything with jumpscares I might elbow you

Dream: YES

Geez: Or punch you in the face

Geez: You know what?

Geez: At the airport, I’ll punch you in the face

Geez: Just for sport

Geez: How about that, green bean

Dream: I am a green bean

Geez: You are indeed

Dream: and you could punch me if you want

Dream: but all’s fair in love and war

Dream: I’m punching you back

Dream: softly

Dream: because you’re a beanpole or something

Dream: and I don’t want to break you

Geez: There will be viral videos of me whacking you in the face with a sharp left hook, mark my words, Dream

Dream: looking forward to it


	2. possums and a heavy disliking of gloves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dream and George continue to be idiots, and their conversation topics stray further and further from god as the story progresses.
> 
> Hallelujah.

The quiet, it was all he'd known. A lull in conversation, a hum of silence. It helped him realize the world sitting at his fingertips.

There were lockers slamming and chattering students and squeaky footfalls and flickering bathroom lights. Little messages either sketched or straight-up engraved into the wall- he would trace them with a calloused fingertip, numb to the commotion outside of the bathroom stall.

He had friends. Plenty. But sometimes he'd be lounging around in biology or gov. and suddenly find himself gazing at the kids conversing by the windows. The little nudges of a palm, the joking shoves, the squeaky complaints mixed with giggly laughter. 

The thing that makes people exist: Being in relation to others.

He'd never been quite comfortable on a normal day of school, and that's fine. The sun would continue baking him alive and his bare wrists would stick to the desktops and sometimes he'd end up with sweat stains on his undershirt, but it never got to him.

He taps a pencil absently against his art project. He didn't know what to do about his prompt.

_ Singing. _

What the fuck was that supposed to mean? In art? Like, pencil art? Who was he supposed to draw, Gerard Way? This was why he likes photography better, dammit. You could take a picture of the trees and label it “singing” and nobody would give a fuck, but Dream can’t do that in art class. He sucks at art. Why did he sign up for this?

Geez: How's art

Geez: I assume it's dry

Dream: very dry

Dream: it's December, after all

Dream: my classmates are talking about possums

Dream: and not gonna lie it's kinda funny how much this random dude knows about possums

Dream: like bro chill

Dream: what're you up to?

Geez: I was lounging around a bit ago

Geez: And watched Buzzfeed Unsolved

Geez: I was misguided in judging your tastes

Dream: how does it feel to be a loser

Geez: Like dancing on a bridge haunted by a goatman

Geez: So, pretty great

Geez: Are you hot?

Dream: I'm fucking  _ scalding _ , George

Dream: my JAWLINE

Geez: For a second there I thought I'd actually managed to slip by unscathed

Geez: But no, apparently not

Dream: it's just so difficult, being this DEVILISHLY handsome

Dream: drop dead gorgeous

Geez: A huh

Geez: Okay

Dream: remember those really old Barbie games?

Dream: the ones where you'd choose a pattern for a dress or some shit and it'd go on the runway

Dream: Barbie fashion show

Geez: Why do you know about this again?

Dream: because I'm cultured

Dream: and they had it on the ass-old computers in the public library 

Dream: but that game influenced my style in many ways

Dream: take notes

Geez: Oh, so you stick patterns haphazardly onto your cropped jackets and pants that fan out at the ends?

Dream: yes

Dream finds himself snickering, doodling a little sketch of George wearing a cropped jacket with crudely placed zig-zag patterns. He whisks a thin Crayola marker from a little metal cup in the middle of the paint-splattered table, and colors it in a bright, blinding yellow. He snaps a picture, sending it off to George.

It looks horrible if he's being honest, but George won't mind.

Geez: Does that jacket have a fluffy collar

Dream: maybe

Geez: I love it

Geez: I could stop by a fabric shop and try to remake it

Dream: you know how to make clothes?

Geez: A little?

Geez: About a year ago I tried it because I was bored and Sap insisted that it'd be a good hobby

Geez: And it sort of stuck, for a while, before I started getting back into Minecraft again and dropped the routine

Dream: what do you know how to make?

Geez: Not gloves, that's for sure

Geez: Gloves are straight-up difficult to make

Geez: Always too tight or too big

Geez: But I can knit scarves and this one time I made the best apron in the history of aprons

Geez: I still have it

Geez: It has little bees embroidered on it because my sister thought "this needs 100% more bees" upon finding it

Dream: can you show me?

Geez: I'm not at home right now

Geez: Grocery shopping

Geez: But I'll send it when I get back

Dream: I'm at the edge of my seat, George

Dream: quaking

Dream: I'm so ready for the embroidered bees

Geez: Oh my god

Geez: Fuck off

Dream: who knows, maybe I'm only your friend because I've been waiting for this moment 

Dream: for the bees

Dream: the BEES, George

Geez: You're only my friend for the bees? ):

Dream: well fuck, George

Dream: that little face at the end was poetic

Dream: Shakespearean, even

Dream: I can't say yes

Dream: I'm under your spell

Dream: your tiny-faced spell

Dream: oh wait this means you're not Slenderman

Dream: hell yeah

Dream: mystery solved

Geez: So I'm your tiny-faced siren?

Dream: sirens listen to no bitch

Dream: but sure

Dream: if we go on a voice call, I might even fall for you

Geez: I'm pretty sure sirens just enchant people

Geez: And then kill them

Dream: still waxing poetry, I see

Geez: Come here Dream

Geez: So I can deliver that promised left hook

Dream: so you can what

Geez: THE PROMISED LEFT HOOK DREAM

Dream: EX FUCKING SCUSE ME

His chest tightens with constrained laughs, trying his best to smother any little wheeze that escapes his mouth.

Geez: Pissbaby

Dream instantly lets out a hysterical, disbelieving laugh. He got a few curious looks for that one, but tries to shrink himself into his seat (despite the fact he's taller than the Empire State Building) and look like he's working.

Good thing the art teacher is chill as fuck, because she only smiles at him and continues on her own painting of a bunch of blobs resembling cats. He delivers a silent fist bump towards her, but she definitely didn't notice. Brain messages don't exist, after all.

Dream: says the star employee of Femboy Hooters

Geez: I'm going to kill you

Dream: I like it rough

Geez: Noted

Dream: would you happen to know anything about singing?

Geez: Signing?

Geez: Fuck no lol

Geez: I can recommend you a few songs, though

Dream: woah, don't pull them all out at once, big boy

Geez: PffCCCHHAAAAAH 

Geez: DREAM

Dream: GEORGE

Geez: Oh my god

Geez: Alright

Geez: You get what you ask for

Geez: A song a day, then, hm?

Dream: fine by me

Geez: [Attachment: 1 image]

Dream connects his wireless earbuds to his phone, going into Spotify and typing in the song. He doesn't know how to pronounce the name, but they have a pretty small following, compared to other big artists.

The song starts off with an old-timey piano, rather simple, yet mysterious. He leans back in his chair, getting into the plucky beat when-

_ Bam!  _ An entire explosion of instruments begins playing, effectively making Dream jump out of his skin, the aftershocks of a jumpscare still wracking his body. The main tune flees along, rushed and almost gleeful, like that of a circus. He's pretty sure there's a goddamn  _ accordion _ playing in the background.

And, just as soon as it had started, the music pulls back a notch, and the accordion takes a front.

Then it startles him for the  _ second  _ time.

Dream: what kind of Dutch-ass tunes are reaching my ear holes right now

Dream: I mean I'm vibing with it but honestly what the FUCK is going on

Dream: it's CHAOS

Geez: It's a festival :)

Dream: you fucking bet it's a festival

Dream: it was like walking along a gravel path, lanterns lighting the way or something, and you approach a tiny tent

Dream: and then you peel back the front flap

Dream: and a goddamn Swedish mariachi band tries to commit manslaughter

Dream: YOUR manslaughter

Geez: It's great, isn't it?

Dream: its fucking SPECTACULAR

Dream: where did you find this??

Geez: Idk, on some random obscure side of YouTube

Geez: I was bored

Geez: And I probably would've forgotten about it if not for the fact it has no lyrics

He gets an idea.

It's a dumb idea-  _ such  _ a dumb idea. But he finds that he wants to draw, he  _ knows  _ what he wants to draw.

Dream: oh my fucking duck fuck

Dream: George you genius

Dream: I could kiss you

He begins planning out the dimensions, putting down a base skeleton for the scenery with a ruler.

Geez: You could-

Geez: Excuse me?

Geez: What did I do

Geez: Dream?

Geez: Was that a promise?

Dream: was what a promise?

Geez: Nothing

Geez: Just

Geez: What did I do?

Dream: the prompt, George

Geez: ???

Dream: THE DRAWING PROMPT

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll make an actual replica of the album cover and put it here, but for now, take the [Attachment: 1 image] and run.
> 
> The song I described is called "Honky Tonk of Wermland" by Detektivbryan. It's a Swedish band, and I listen to it religiously.


	3. I'll sit here in my little gay farm and perish, thank you

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dream joins in on a small stream, he talks of little bits of his childhood, and they joke as per usual.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This brought me back to the soundtracks for Little Big Planet and Need For Speed: Most Wanted. We vibing, boys
> 
> (Didn't look over the chapter too much, so there might be a few grammar mistakes. Sorry.)

Geez: Are you seriously listening to Brother by Gerard Way while playing Stardew Valley

Dream: how the fuck did you know that

Dream: can’t get a smidge of privacy in this house

Geez: Your Spotify says you’re listening to Brother

Geez: And I can see what game you’re playing on Steam

Dream: christ

Dream: aren’t you the finest detective on the swash-bucklin yee-hawin see-sawin countryside

Dream: why the FUCK is Arctic Monkeys playing right now

Geez: Your Spotify decided that the sexytimes would commence

Dream: my Spotify can kindly fuck off

Dream: and of course it starts just as we’re beginning to talk

Dream: sends a message, don’t it

Geez: It could send several different messages, one of them being that you’re very apparently sad

Geez: And kinky

Dream: are you going to read my tarot next

Geez: No, I know enough based on the fact that you’re a Leo

Dream: stop

Geez: So you’re playing Stardew Valley without me?

Geez: I thought we were friends, Dream

Geez: I thought we were buddies

Geez: The best of pals

Dream: homoerotic life partners

Geez: HOMOEROTIC LIFE PARTNERS

Dream: did you want an invite?

Dream: I thought you were streaming today

Geez: Speaking of…

Dream: wow okay

Dream: christ did you PLAN this

Dream: is this an intervention?

Dream: are you going to leave me in the pouring rain while an orchestra reaches the peak of a crescendo in the not-so-back background

Dream: saying that I’m “too lame to be included in my streams, Dream”

Dream: and I’ll stand there, crying

Dream: maybe fall to my knees and shatter a few fucking bones on the way

Dream: raindrops caressing my face, city lights illuminating the silent night sky like haunting visages

Dream: hot girl shit idk

Geez: Are you okay?

Dream: no, never

Dream: answer the original question

Geez: It’s not an intervention

Geez: Well, not exactly

Dream: I’m on the edge of my seat, George

Dream: while Verbatim by Mother Mother plays in the background

Dream: not even dramatic at all, I’m literally bopping my head along to the music

Geez: You know I love your wiggles

Dream: George

Geez: Right

Geez: I was actually wondering if you wanted to join in with my streams more?

Geez: Not enough to like

Geez: Tank your grades or anything

Geez: But I like having you there

Geez: And the viewers do too

Dream: is this a long-winded version of you asking permission to stream us playing Stardew Valley

Geez: Sort of?

Geez: I meant it in its entirety

Geez: But yeah we can also stream Stardew Valley

Dream: excellent

They stream Stardew Valley. They buy four chickens (Laser Pointer, Diglett, Sticky Keys, and Kevin), Dream snorts chocolate milk on accident, George tries to shove an entire packet of crackers in his mouth and fails (horribly), and they eventually find themselves sitting at their desks with three hours of playtime logged.

“You’re a tardigrade,” Dream starts with a little, wheezy chuckle.

“ _ I’m  _ a tardigrade-” George cuts himself off, continuing with new bravado, “Oh, fuck, what is  _ that _ -”

“Sea bears,” Dream says in an impossibly high voice, immediately laughing at himself. He feels drunk, cheeks stinging with warmth and stretched taught from smiling so much.

“They look like caterpillars, but- they just aren’t! What-”

Dream finds himself giggling, and it sounds like he’s being strangled. “Sea bears!”

“Amoeba,” George says in a much too serious voice, and suddenly they’re laughing together.

“What the fuck was that! What the fuck was that!” Dream shrieks, leaning back in his chair to try and ease the pain in his abdomen.

“They don’t have  _ legs _ !”

“They’re fucking amoeba, George, of course they don’t have legs!”

“Fuck,” George chokes out, and the thumping from his end must be him setting his forehead against his desk. “They don’t have legs.”

“Why are you so  _ distraught  _ about this?”

“How would you like it if you didn’t have legs?”

“I’m not an amoeba, George!”

“You’re not an enigma?”

“An am- an aneurism-”

George bursts into another giggling fit. “Fuck, this is so bad.”

“An anin- aneno- ananom- anemone-”

“Shhhhhh, shut up! Shut-” More laughing.

“So dumb. How did you pass-” Dream takes a large gulp of breath- “fifth-grade biology?”

“You had biology in fifth grade?”

“No!” he lets the word out like air escaping a constrained balloon.

They were hopeless from the start.

“You had to learn about amoebas in fifth grade ‘biology’?!”

“Still not biology!” Dream chokes out. His voice is high-pitched again.

“Amoebas?”

George says the word with such a wildly confused voice that Dream almost falls out of his chair in a giggling fit. It sounded so much like the “Da Vinky?” TikTok. Too much like the “Da Vinky?” TikTok.

***

Dream: fuuuuuuuck

Geez: Well hello to you too

Dream: I hit my foot on the doorway

Dream: and kicked it again to assert my dominance

Geez: Natural selection is really kicking in, isn't it

Geez: You kick doors to assert your dominance?

Dream: its a man thing

Dream: you wouldn't know

Geez: ….

Geez: Did you just call me a little boy

Dream: I called you a little pissbaby thats what

Dream gets a call from George. He cackles.

The moment he presses the green button, George's voice blares through his earbuds, "Okay, firstly, I'm not a little pissbaby. Fuck you."

"Sure."

"Secondly- Sure?" George sounds infuriated, doing a double-take at Dream.

"Yeah. Sure." Dream knows he sounds like a sarcastic little shit with a smile in his voice, but he keeps his words vague and frustrating.

It works. "Right, okay, secondly, you fucking assert your 'dominance'-" Dream can practically  _ hear  _ the air quotes through his voice- "after stubbing your toe? Who the fuck does that?"

"Me. I do that."

There's a pause. "Sometimes I truly wonder why one of my best friends is a raging dumbass."

"You just sit there and contemplate my dumbassery?"

_ "Yes." _

"Sounds gay."

There's a shuffling sound. He mutters barely above a breath, "That would be a fair assessment."

"A who what?"

"Nothing. Nevermind."

Dream flops back down onto his bed, limbs stretching out and adjusting like a cat’s. He drops his hands over his stomach, smacking his lips together a few times.

“I’m bored,” he says, blowing a raspberry.

“You’re always bored.”

“Entertain me.”

George makes a little humming sound. “Entertain you? I can’t do shit over the phone.”

“I dunno, moan or something.”

There’s a loud, ear-piercing laugh. “DREAM!”

“It was bound to come up sooner or later. Embrace your inner pornstar.”

“Fuck, give me a minute. I have to come to terms with the fact that my knee-jerk reaction upon seeing you for the first time will be strangulation.”

Dream wheezes. “Ooh, we getting-”

“Don’t even start.”

“You didn’t even know what I was about to say!”

“You were about to go ‘Ooh, we getting kinky?’ and start laughing at your own joke.”

“I have an excellent sense of humor.”

_ “Dicks,”  _ George deadpans.

Dream immediately busts out laughing.

“Myth: busted.”

He gasps in a lungful of air only to have it escape it in a long, raspy cackle. “That’s cheating.”

“I beg your fucking pardon?”

Dream takes a large, fluttering breath. “You heard me, goggle boy.”

“I-” There’s a snort, and George starts giggling. “Fuck you.”

They sit and try to collect themselves, but they always end up laughing again. It’s like a chain reaction, one goes down and the other soon falls, too. Dream’s jaw hurts, and he feels like he’s been hollowed out like a pumpkin, but he’s still smiling.

“I want you to listen to something,” George says, after a small interlude of silence.

“Song of the day?”

“Song of the day.”

Geez: [Attatchment: 1 image]

He recognizes it immediately. “The Orb of Dreamers”.

The nostalgic, carefree instrumental comes into focus slowly and surely, soon accompanied by a delicate tune. It feels so fragile, yet he finds himself falling into the song easily. He sees watery blues and yellows and pinks- every color, even. They float up and into the hollow sky, blinking at him with childish curiosity.

He’s submerged in the sound before he knows it, smelling hose water and fresh air and the weird warm burnt smell of their beaten-up heater in the basement.

“Are you okay?” George asks, gently. His voice doesn’t feel like an interception- no, it’s a welcome comfort. It grounds him without completely pulling him from the daydream-like tranquility.

“It’s so… vague,” Dream says, and he finds himself smiling-  _ beaming _ , heart swelling with joy. He wants to move, there’s so much energy humming under his skin. Even he can hear the evident elation thickly intertwined with his voice when he says, “I missed this.”

“You know it?”

“There’s this kids game I used to play with my sister.  _ Little Big Planet _ .” His heart gives a bittersweet tug at the name, a longing weight crushing his chest. “It- It was stupid, really-”

“No,” George interrupts. “It doesn’t sound stupid at all.”

Dream snuffs, the sound reminiscent of a laugh. “There were these… colors. The world constructed in that game, it was really pretty. Throughout the entire franchise, there was this continued theme of just…”

He takes a deep breath. He remembers the days after school when he would jump right onto the PS3 and play it, getting lost in a dream world. His memories were almost orange-tinted, fuzzy and warm and safe.

He remembers skateboards and sharks piercing through neon-colored floaties and dim forests and, funnily enough, a meerkat strip club.

It really was a weird game. That last one flew right over his sister’s head.

“A theme of imagination. It was so… different. It was one of a kind.” His eyes sting. “I miss it, a little.”

“I understand.”

“There was a meerkat strip club.”

“Sorry- There was a  _ what _ ?”

Dream chuckles. “A meerkat strip club. It was in the main levels, too. Something about a meerkat and his concerned mom and you ventured down into the club. Or something.”

“What else do you remember?” There’s rustling- probably blankets- on George’s end. He must be getting comfortable.

“I don’t want to bore you.”

“You couldn’t bore me if you tried.”

A flush of heat sweeps over Dream’s face. “Um. Fuck, well…”

“Losing your cool, Dream?”

“No,” he objects instantly. “Fuck off.”

“Then tell me about  _ Little Big Planet _ .”

He takes a deep breath, and he talks.

He talks about the copious amount of roleplay levels that always seemed to look phenomenal, and with calming sounds. He’d been to a very aesthetically pleasing log cabin in the winter, a modern house with a garden of roses, a beach-side getaway. 

He tells George about one of the most popular tracks from the second installment of the game: the instrumental to “Sleepyhead”, by Passion Pit. He admitted that he can barely bring himself to listen to it because too much was packed into it. “Orb of Dreamers” was getting to him? “Sleepyhead” was a whole different ball game.

He recalls all the people he met, specifically in scary levels. There was one on Jeff the Killer, with old mechanics and a glitch where Jeff gets spawned twice. He’d played it at least a million times, met a million people, had memorized where and when Jeff spawns. There were, of course, better horror levels. Scarier, more advanced ones. But that was a classic. Everyone knew about it. It was hot shit. The best of hot shit.

George laughed when Dream told him that the antagonist for Little Big Planet 2 was a vacuum cleaner. When he asked who the villain was in the first one, Dream couldn’t really answer- The guy was a midget duck thing, or something, fuck if he knows.

“What’d they call corrupted robots again, in that game?” George asked, knowing full well what the answer was.

There was a pause. Then, “Meanies.”

He got a kick out of that one.

They talked all night, voices growing dim and sleepy as the hours melded together. Dream was the last to be awake, noticing after a long pause that George had actually fallen asleep, his steady breaths barely audible through Dream's earbuds.

He smiles, because somewhere far, far away, George is passed out on his bed, hair a mess, chest slowly rising and falling with his breaths.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow the extent of which I PROJECTED-  
> Little Big Planet is a great game. Check it out.  
> I would say "the plot will kick in soon" but this is literally the plot. Dream goes from high school to adulthood while talking to George. At one point his liking of photography makes an appearance. This is a text fic, idk if you really wanted too much plot or not. I wanted to focus more on their conversations rather than... something bigger, I guess.
> 
> I'm sorry if this halfway steady schedule of updates thins out a little, because I really gotta focus on school to get a baseline of 3.5 GPA and soon have a job. But please know that your comments and kudos mean everything, so thank you for taking a moment to check out this story. It means a lot, as an aspiring author.
> 
> Alright, enough of that mushy stuff.   
> Cya in the next one xoxo

**Author's Note:**

> I had previously deleted this fic because I̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶c̶o̶w̶a̶r̶d̶ I was thinking too hard about everything.
> 
> Then I read it, laughed at my own jokes, and decided something. If I could make anyone else laugh, anyone at all, I'd keep it up. Even if I couldn't muster up the courage to finish it.
> 
> So, we're back. And I'll only be deleting it (again) if George and/or Dream state that they've grown to become uncomfortable with the shipping.
> 
> C'ya!


End file.
